


Paint the Silence

by Papillonae



Series: LietPol Week (2018) [3]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Angst, M/M, Music, Piano, Playing Piano Together, Silence, Singing, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-09
Updated: 2018-04-09
Packaged: 2019-04-20 21:34:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14270010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Papillonae/pseuds/Papillonae
Summary: After being robbed of the sound of each others’ company through the years, Poland and Lithuania make up for lost time with music to drown the lonely silence of the past.Written for LietPol Week, Day 3: Silence.





	Paint the Silence

**Author's Note:**

> Ahh, forgive me for posting a lot of these submissions so late! Though it's been almost two months since I've written these, I had promised to reupload all my submissions after some editing.
> 
> I do promise that in the future (once the writing event I'm currently involved in really gets underway) you'll be seeing more fic from me about characters OTHER than these two... :) Not that there's anything wrong with Lithuania and Poland, of course!

It was on his birthday - a particularly sunless autumn day in 1989 - that Poland played the piano again for the first time in years.

At first, it’s only because he’s lonely and bored; he plays just small strains of open fifths and improvised harmonies. His fingers press lightly - tentatively - as he struggles with muscle memory behind the keys. He can hear one of Chopin’s mazurkas in the distance, but only faintly.

The incomprehensible silence of oblivion - of  _death_  - is still deafening.

But he keeps at it anyway. He digs up the music underneath his stool, no longer fearing the weight of the keys, and just  _plays_. It’s discordant, it’s rhythmically all over the place, his fingers tremble from the reach and the atrophy - but  _damnit -_  he’s  _trying_.

He plays for seven hours straight, his fingers red and raw from slamming them on the keys in frustration. The last attempt is met with a frustrated yell and a loud clatter as he stands from the stool, followed by the fluttering of sheet music across the wooden floor.

He can’t hear it.  _His_  music… the music of hispeople…

His head still feels like it’s underwater. There’s a pressure that threatens to cave in on either side, and he holds his head tightly - fingers helplessly clinging, threaded through his hair - as he desperately tries to forget the feeling of tearing, of disappearing…

And,  _oh_ , the absolute end. The void. An echoless chamber he’d been confined to  _twice_ still haunts him.

Even with his house rebuilt and his body risen from the rubble of war, he can’t shake that inescapable silence from his mind.

* * *

A year later, he brings Lithuania home. It’s not  _their_  home, but he’s agreed to stay with him for a while, and Poland is so eager for company that he practically drags him through his city streets.

Neither of them speak as they walk together through the threshold of his home. Even after the door closes, there’s a lingering silence between them.

Lithuania notices the towering stacks of sheet music beside the piano. He asks Poland about it, but Poland just waves it off. He had been cleaning out his old scores of music to sell. He can't quite bear parting with any of it yet, so he left it alone so he can decide on it later. Presently, he heads into the kitchen to fix them both some coffee.

He’s halfway back into the living room with both mugs in his hands when he first hears it - a shaky chord from the piano, a shuffling of papers, and Lithuania gently singing:

 _“Nie zgaśnie tej przyjaźni żar,_  
co połączyła nas.  
Nie pozwolimy by ją starł  
nieubłagany czas…”

It’s a simple campfire song, and it sounds like  _Auld Lang Syne_. Lithuania’s fingers are clumsy on the keys, his hands stretched like large spiders across them, and he laughs at his mistakes.

But  _God -_ Poland nearly gasps as the tears wet his cheeks -  _Lithuania is singing his language_ , and he can hear that as clear as a bell.

He puts the mugs down on the side table, and when Lithuania looks up to thank him for the coffee, he doesn’t have time to react as Poland quickly takes him in his arms, seizing him by the shoulders. Lithuania can hear the hitch in his breath, and he hugs back just as eagerly.

 _This_ silence, Poland decides, is the only acceptable one.

Lithuania scoots aside to make room at the piano, and Poland presses in beside him, his elbows extended as his fingers greet the keys like an old friend. 

He can finally hear it -  _his music_  - and the encroaching silence of oblivion seems so far away now.

He smiles gently as he and Lithuania harmonize together:

“ _Kto raz przyjaźni poznał moc,_  
nie będzie trwonić słów.  
Przy innym ogniu, w inną noc  
do zobaczenia znów…“

**Author's Note:**

> I don't have a direct song translation for the song used here, but I do know that it is a campfire song - and I'm fairly certain it's a Farewell Song.
> 
> To sum up (with what rudimentary Polish I understand): "The campfire is dying now, and the brotherly circle is coming undone. And in the quiet night under the light of the stars, we make our final handshakes. For we know the power of our bond, we do not need to say goodbye. With another fire on a different night, we will see each other again, for the heat that connects us will not go out, and we will not let our time together fade."


End file.
